The Dustbin
Day 24: Community Service Part 1
7th of Blue Sea Moon, Afternoon
"Hurry up people!" barked the foreman, "daylight's still burning! The village ain't gonna fix itself so move your keisters!"
As punishment for triggering a war and violating numerous intercontinental policies regarding border control and property damage law, the ignominious class of Garreg Mach, the Dustbin were all sentenced to a full month of hard labor to repair all the damages that they've indirectly caused in the regions of Arundel and Varley during the past month's little mishap/potential geopolitical crisis. Of course, given that one, the border trespasses weren't entirely their fault (the pursuers after Topaz and Cyrus were persistent beyond any reason to say the least; typical of the more zealous of Faerghus's Knights) and two, the Archbishop wanted the academy's troublemakers out of sight for the preparations of the annual Goddess's Rite of Rebirth, a very important festival/pilgrimage to Garreg Mach. Not only an order of execution for the perpetrators during a holy month would be bad taste (and PR), but considering that all of the evidence surrounding the Dustbin were circumstantial at best, a slap to the wrist was the most appropriate (and proportionate) punishment for Professor Karna Yuga's class.
Granted, they were allowed to rest a few more days due to let their injuries heal properly before heading towards their commuted sentence, however, the circumstances surrounding their situation didn't make their incursion any less humiliating (nor painful).
"Bloody 'ell..." groaned Sorcha as she sawn another plank to its according length to fix a wrecked market stall, "why do I gotta bust me back for bunch of imperial shites?"
"Speak for yourself," Byron called out as he sat on the partially-covered rooftop of a rebuilt cottage, nailing the boards into their places with a hammer, "after Arundel, it's Varley next."
"How de hell did ye break down a whole hut?" Selene remarked as she looked at the other laborers clearing the rubble to make way for another repair job, "let alone, a whole plot?"
"Not my fault that those houses were made of shoddy materials," shrugged Cyrus as he and Darius carted in more building supplies in their (borrowed-read: not stolen) carriage, "I'm having a harder time figuring out why they bother rebuilding when they're this easily destroyed."
"Fodlan is clearly fragile than I," sighed out Topaz as she climbed up a wooden post of a nearly-rebuilt building to deliver more nails to another laborer, "such is the price of being born and living in a comparative paradise."
"Damn foreign savages..." muttered the worker as he took the nails from the minute Hassashin.
"Normally, I've judged them less favorably..." Karna remarked towards the workers alongside themselves as he came out of a recently-erected building frame of the village's tavern being rebuilt, "... but that's in the past. We got a whole month ahead of us, so get back to work before he comes back."
And speaking of the devil, the white-armored Alois comes striding in, ever bearing his perpetually-sunny demeanor even facing the relatively-gloomy Dustbin.
"I knew you lot can do it!" beamed the Warrior Knight of Seiros before he looked at the group to find one of them missing, "strange, where's the bandaged one, Vidar?"
Again, at cue, the feral boy pops out of a bale of straw meant for the rooftops, munching on some of the dry plant matter as if it were the most normal thing in the world.
"No, bad, spit it out," Byron grumbled as he came back down to correct his friend's behavior, "we need those for cottages."
"... Bill...ding?" tilted the boy's head in confusion.
Karna drags his palm down his face in frustration. "At times like these, I curse the fact that we're only good for killing and not menial labor."
"Silver lining, at least you and your class are being compensated for your hard work!" Alois attempted to cheer up the professor, "either way, you can say that you're still making, a killing!"
The entirety of the Dustbin along with the nearby laborers present groan at the Knight of Seiros' attempt at a punny jest.
"Go die in a fire."
Back at Garreg Mach...
"... Do you hear that, Seteth?" Rhea remarked as she heard the birds chirp and the (normal) students communing at the campus ground below the balcony that she'd stood over, "peace and tranquility."
"Yes," the man replied with a subtle smile and nod, "although that's more due to everything going according to plan without anything getting in our way."
"Is it a sin to send stray sheep away to atone? Let alone, enjoy a moment of peace and tranquility?" the Archbishop asked with a content smile on her face, "I just believe that everyone has their proper places throughout the fabric of creation, as the Goddess wills it."
Seteth lets out a resigned sigh. "Naive of me to say, but I wish that were the case for everybody."
"That's where we come in," Rhea pointed out, "we help the helpless and punish those who bring harm upon the helpless."
The two contemplate in silence upon finding nothing else to say. Yes, a single day of peace and no excess paperwork proved to me rather alien for them. How humorous in hindsight that a few months of chaos with the cursed Professor who was not supposed to be here in the first place could do this much to them and their states of mind.
... It honestly felt a bit boring. Disturbingly so.
"... I must confess, Lady Rhea," Seteth spoke, "but is it sinful for me to ask for something interesting to happen? At least something that will rid ourselves of this awkward silence-"
Beyond where they've stood, the pair of doors leading out of the audience chamber burst open, revealing an exhausted Soldier with a roll of paper in hand.
"Report," spoke Seteth, putting on his professional attitude without missing a beat.
"Huff... a... a message..." heaved the Church Soldier, "... written... in blood..."
The Archbishop and the adherent exchanged looks with each other.
"... Please tell me you actually fell for a prank," Seteth groaned out, "the Dustbin just left for Arundel a few days prior. We do not need this!"
"The message," Rhea remarked as the Soldier handed her the roll of paper. She unfurls the message and just as the frightened man claimed, the following words were written in blood.
THE FALSE PROPHET DIES
AT THE WANING OF THE BLUE MOON
AS THE SEAS RUN RED
Seteth pinches the bridge of his nose and exhales a heavily-suppressed sigh of annoyance. "A simple 'I will kill you' is too much to express nowadays," he grumbled out, "Archbishop? Your orders?"
"Inform both the Professor and Catherine," Rhea replied, "tighten all security but be sure that no one outside our own armed forces know of this order."
"And you," Seteth spoke to the messenger, "do you know who sent the letter?"
"It... was found... among the public mailbox... during the... mid-parcel... inspection!" he replied, still haggard from being short of breath, "far as anyone knows... it could've been... anyone from this continent!"
Seteth and Rhea both exchanged looks of mutual agreement towards each other. That whoever this letter of blood came from, were heavily related to the ones behind the "incidents" from the past few months.
Nevertheless, they must keep the facade of peace. In the name of order that they've worked and fought so hard for.
9th of Blue Sea Moon, Afternoon
"Come on, people!" barked the foreman leading the village repairs, "deadline's next week! So put your backs to it!"
A chorus of "yes sir"s was heard throughout the workplace from the working men. The Dustbin however, groaned in resignation, only because they're now at their beginning stages of going into a murder withdrawal as they continued to trudge through their labor.
"Look on the bright side!" Alois chimed in as he and his entourage of Barbarians walked by, "it's better to build and create rather than destroy!"
"Then why did you join the Church's military in the first place?" Byron pointed out as he carried a loose door under his arm before setting it against the recently-finished wall, "I mean, an axe is the least subtle method of killing someone, you know."
"For me!" Alois lifted up a heavy barrel of plaster for the brick walls up to his chest, "I'd like to think an axe can be more than just a tool of destruction!" he stated as he walked next to the boy, "an axe can chop wood into firewood to keep people warm! Make lumber to build houses! Break open barrels to share a drink with others! And defend others from wild beasts and those who wish harm upon others! A weapon is only a weapon when you think of it as only a weapon! Surely, a genius like you should know that, correct?"
Byron silently agreed, as much as he hated to admit it. In fact, he himself has used his own [Hand Axe] and old hatchet as cooking irons to feed both himself and Vidar back when they were kids.
"You know..." Byron sighed out as Alois set the barrel of plaster down next to him, "... you're a decent person to talk to as long as no puns come slipping out of your lips."
"I have a daughter around her age," Alois pointed towards Topaz, who was currently scaling from rooftop to rooftop with tiles in her hands, "she and my wife are the whole world to me. And I'll do anything to make the world a better for them to live in."
"... Uh, yeah, about Topaz..." Byron pointed out, "she's my age."
Alois blinks for a moment before looking back at Topaz's short stature.
"... Has she been eating well?" the Knight of Seiros asked with genuine concern.
"Nope," Byron replied, "in fact, she claimed that she can go for a long time without food and water. Helps keep her body, or so she said," he pointed out, "we tried to feed her once and nearly lost our fingers in the process. She's a natural-born hunger artist."
"Ah, then I won't pry," Alois retreated elsewhere before Topaz drops down onto the barrel next to Byron.
"He's too pure for this world, yet chooses to fight all the same," Topaz commented as she sat down on where she landed, "those are the kind of men who die needless deaths."
"... Is that really a bad thing?" Byron pointed out, "I mean, he's dumb, but he has his reasons for living."
"To each their own," Karna spoke from behind the two, "or so I've heard."
"Professor?" Byron raised an eyebrow at Karna's expression.
"The hardest part is usually trying to find some good in this world full of evil," the Professor remarked before letting out a small sigh, "faith, fortune, fighting, fornicating, everyone desperately finds a reason to continue living. It's actually a miracle that I'm still alive, despite everything-"
"HEY! WATCH OUT!" a worker from above yelled out as a loose plank fell from the slanted rooftop above the three, the flat point of wood hitting Karna on top of his head.
"PROFESSOR!" both Topaz and Byron yelled out at the keeling professor, who by some miracle, didn't bleed profusely from where he was hit.
"I'm fine... I'm fine..." Karna groaned out as he unfurled his hood to reveal a dented steel helmet strapped onto his head, "with this atop my scalp, I am invincible-!"
Karna was then immediately taken down by a lumber's shaft after a worker accidentally made a sharp turn and hit the Professor's face, knocking him flat onto his back and his nose slightly scrunched inwards.
"Professor?" Byron called out, now unamused at the man's hubris, "now are you okay?"
"I want... my daddy..." Karna slurred out, "he was a glow orb... that went rah."
Both Byron and Topaz let out a collective sigh of relief.
"He'll live."
12th of Blue Sea Moon, Evening
"Professor," Edelgard spoke to Byleth as the two were sitting next to each other at the mess hall, "about the death threat delivered to the Archbishop..."
"Eh, not the first one I've heard," the Professor replied as she took a huge bite out of her meat pie, "we'll cross that bridge when we get to it. For now, focus on your studies and skills, kay?"
"Please refrain from talking while eating," Hubert groaned, "you're getting food all over yourself and others."
"Tell that to Caspar," Byleth remarked as she pointed towards the table across from theirs, the aforementioned student competing with Raphael to see who can eat the most food between the two, the latter not even looking bothered as the former (body size being a factor of consumption).
"... For goodness sake, he's sorely lacking in decorum," the morose student sighed out, "if anything, Linhardt actually staying awake during supper should be a blessing of in itself..." he grimaced at the sight of the narcoleptic student buried himself with towers of books and empty plates of Saghert and Cream, "... if he didn't immediately skip to dessert, that is."
"Hey look," Byleth pointed to the white-haired girl heading towards where Linhardt was sitting at, "he's got a little study buddy."
"Aww, how sweet. He made a friend," Dorothea commented as she walked by, "oh, hello professor! Bernie's told me that she's not hungry, which basically means that she wants cake," she winked to the professor.
"Got it," Byleth replied as she immediately got up and grabbed a plate of dessert and strode out of the mess hall.
"... Since when were you two that close?" asked Edelgard.
"Jealous?" teased Dorothea with a giggle, "don't worry Edie, I can share."
Outside with a plate of pastry in hand, Byleth and Sothis began communicating with each other mentally.
It's been over a week, spoke Sothis, you and kiddos doing alright for themselves?
Believe me, that so called "pacification" last week was completely unjustified, she confessed, still slightly disapproving at the course of that they've taken of killing an embittered old man, still, not in my place to turn down a job or question orders. I got the little ones to look out for.
Of that accursed man who didn't participate, Sothis questioned about Karna and the events preceding before their incursion last week, I wonder what happened?
It'd be real funny if he and his class were the ones who instigated in the first place, the ex-sellsword grimly joked to alleviate the slightly dark topic, personally, I think the whole Dustbin being sent out for a month-long labor job is the Church's way of keeping appearances.
Curious, but what's your opinion on them? the amnesic spirit asked.
Honestly, I think they'd make the worst clients if I've met them in my days as a sword for hire, Byleth answered, finally letting out her grievances that she held in for a bit while, not only they have little to no money and sense, but with how many enemies they all collectively have, it'd be the worst job I would've ever taken, she continued on with her semi-rant, oh and their personalities are kind of garbage. Not as bad as nobles me and my dad as rich clients, but more akin farcical fools that I'd see as part of a dysfunctional performance troupe with Karna as some sort of cursed fool acting as a ringmaster.
It's almost sad really, said the spirit, I took a gander at their eyes and they don't have eyes like the children that you normally teach, she pointed out, they have eyes-
Like mine?
Sothis nods. And I suppose you don't get those kinds of eyes for being treated like human garbage for years straight.
Byleth lets out a sigh as she knocks on Bernadetta's door.
"Hey," the Professor called out through the door as she set the dish on the floor next to it, "I brought cake."
Sounds of numerous locks being unlocked were heard behind the door before it creaked open. Out of the gap, an arm slowly stretched out of the darkness before snatching the dessert away into its cloister before door was slammed back shut followed up with several locks ticking back in place.
"... Um, thanks for the cake, professor," the timid girl spoke behind closed doors.
"... Yeah," Byleth replied, not knowing what to do without triggering her anxieties.
Although, to be fair, if it were that brute of a man who calls himself a Professor had his way, the disembodied spirit commented, he would've dragged her face through the mud to make her "get over it".
Byleth didn't consider herself an emotive person to begin with, but even she knew when or when not to cross... "certain" boundaries. If she didn't, her clientele for her past sellsword career would be next to nothing.
"... Look, to be honest, I don't know what you have gone through to make you like this," the ex-sellsword confessed, trying to get the girl in her class to open up, "but... if you need help... you can trust me," she fumbled her words, trying not to sound forced.
"... You know..." Bernadetta spoke out, much to both Byleth's and Sothis' surprise, "... you're way better than Professor Karna and his class," she opened up, albeit slightly.
"Heard that they won't be here for a whole month," Byleth smirked, "they're fixing up Arundel before they move to Varley," she pointed out.
Bernadetta nervously chuckles a little. "Well... hope my father likes their company more than I do..." she spoke in a jittery tone, "... or at the very least... my father enjoys their company more than mine..."
Both Byleth and Sothis raise an eyebrow at the implications of Bernadetta hoping that the Dustbin kill her father through their sheer, collective bad luck alone.
Red flag, Sothis warned, for both the daughter and the father.
Byleth nods with a slightly-spooked expression. The girl needs help. Serious help. "Bernadetta, wanna continue to talk this over tea tomorrow?" she reached out, "... I'll bring cake."
"... Uh, yeah," Bernadetta replied, "... sure."
And the rest of the night went on as usual, sans the realization that Byleth had about her own class and by extension, every student here in the monastery that had gathered across Fodlan, that had now settled into her mind.
Apparently, she and Karna weren't even considered the crazies around here. But in hindsight, the reason why she and her father's band of sellswords had so many jobs prior to her current profession now made sense, in the worst way possible.
Evidently, asking for a normal upbringing without conflict or trauma around Fodlan is too much to ask. Everyone here is hurt one way or another as much as the outside.
13th of Blue Sea Moon, Morning
"Oi!" Sorcha asked the foreman as she looked around their camp to see the laborers sleeping in, "why aren't we working? Didncha say that we're supposed to start working when sun comes up?"
"Eh, forget about it," the gruff man replied, "it's Sunday," he replied, "the Goddess has created this world in seven days, with the last day being a day of rest. Half of my boys are freshening themselves up to go to a local chapel for services."
"... Oh," she replied, "been workin' our arses off way before comin' ere," Sorcha pointed out, remembering their months prior of playing catch-up with the rest of the academy.
"Well, it ain't my place to judge," the resting foreman replied, "I'll grab myself last night's leftovers before I get some shuteye..."
With that out of the way, Sorcha then ponders on what to do in this day of rest. In a brief lapse of judgement, she sniffs her pits only to be greeted with a rancid stench.
"Alright, time to bathe," she sighed out, grabbing the nearest buckets available and fetching her twin sister for their day off.
Elsewhere in the middle of the woods, both Byron and Topaz were in a middle of target practice on whatever they can find. Right now, they were tossing [Hand Axes], pebbles, nails, and magic alike at a stump.
"I miss my knives already," Topaz bemoaned as she skipped a stone toward the stump, "apparently, knives are banned in combat use between fighters. Uh... why?" she pointed out.
"According to Fodlan charter between the three nations, knives aren't recognized in Fodlan's line weapons that their job promotion system an use," Byron pointed out, "the only things that you can use for them are as gifts, accessories, and adornments."
"So by that logic..." Topaz groaned as she picked up a nail before flicking it towards the stump, the tip burying itself into the wood, "... it's illegal for noncombatant civilians to kill a man with anything sharp or create new kinds of weaponry?"
"I only said or implied I was a bounty hunter before I became a student," Byron grinned as he tossed another [Hand Axe] to the stump, "never said I was actually a legal bounty hunter."
"How in Allah and Azra-eil's grace did you not end up behind bars?" the Hassan asked.
"I bribed a lot of people, some more reciprocating than others," Byron replied with a smug smirk, "apparently, being devout worshippers of the Goddess doesn't make them exempt from earning a little extra gold on the side," he rubbed his thumb and index fingers together, "human nature is weird like that, which I can always appreciate when it goes my way."
Topaz rolls her eyes as she threw the last [Hand Axe] towards the stump, only for the thrown projectile to not make it past more than a mere foot.
"... Too unbalanced," she pouted, "how do you even throw that thing?"
"You ever threw a vase?" asked Byron, to which Topaz shook her head before he grabbed both of her wrists and felt the tendons around them with his thumbs, "hmm, guess that explains it."
"What?" she asked.
"Your arms and hands are too used to throwing balanced weapons, like swords and even spears," Byron pointed out, "do Almyra have axes?"
"Saddle axes for their mounted men, land and air," Topaz answered, "when we find them, we break off the side blades to make our swords. The shafts are used as spikes for our pit traps to deter intruders."
"Ah," Byron remarked, "do you want to try using axes? They're more practical than you think."
"What are they used for besides killing?" she asked, looking at the [Hand Axe] lying next to her feet.
"Cutting wood, breaking through locks, cooking meat, bludgeoning..." Byron listed off the things he did with a basic gardener's hatchet, "... what? You honestly expected that a weapon can only be used to kill?"
"Can you eat poison?" Topaz shot back, to which Byron stared at her blankly at the obvious case of pot calling the kettle black, "... present company excluded?"
Elsewhere, Karna, Vidar and Cyrus were all wondering around the open atop of Darius's massive back, looking for something else to do due to them not having any books or academic material to help them (read: Cyrus) play catch up. With anxiety and stress building up between the trio, the three were looking for any highwaymen preying on unsuspecting churchgoers to either extort or murder (usually both).
... And to their displeasure, the three of them find every bandit hiding about being rounded up by Alois and his men, all of the ne'er-do-wells being marched off elsewhere by the squad of Church-enlisted squad of Barbarians.
"Oh come on!" Karna cried out at the battle being already over, "at least save us some before we get here!"
"Sorry! But this is a professional operation!" Alois strictly pointed out, "I have been given strict orders to both make sure you do your assigned work and keep your class out of needless trouble!" he said, without a hint of irony or his signature jovial nature, "nothing personal, but if you're going to complain, take it to Seteth by the end of this month."
Vidar scratches his temple beneath his bandages before dismounting.
"... Look," Alois spoke to Karna and the other two, "I talked to Byron a while back and as I watched you and the others working, I noticed something and I'm sort of getting to understand how you all feel," he pointed out with absolute sincerity, "Fodlan's a foreign place, a land where your sense of familiarity doesn't match the people's here, and I get it," said the Knight of Seiros, "but if you don't open up, then how are you able to achieve a mutual understanding between yourselves and your peers? You can't stay closed up forever! You have to be willing to reach out first with open hands rather than closed fists!"
"This coming from someone who has a giant slab of sharpened metal and gets paid to swing it at other people," Cyrus deadpanned.
"That's besides the point!" Alois rebuffed, "what I'm suggesting is, can you find it in yourselves to put your best foot forward and maybe come to an understanding?"
Karna lets out a sigh before looking the Knight of Seiros in the eye. "Look pun-man, I get that you're being sincere and I really welcome it," the Professor pointed out, "but here's the thing, our best foot forward was long severed off years prior because the people of Fodlan refused to give us a chance," he stated, the glare from his shrunken pupils aimed at Alois, "let me tell you, spoiled sheep and savage mongrels alike all deserve one thing from us; nothing. Because as far as they're concerned, we're simply a disturbance to their peace of mind with our own existence alone. If peace and understanding could be that easy to achieve, then the Church would've easily turned the whole continent into an uncontested theocracy as far as I'm concerned. So the next time you suggest of 'giving a chance', let the record show, sheep don't like the mere chance of their pens being breached, let alone, give outsiders and naysayers a chance to prove themselves."
"That's not true for everyone," Alois protested coolly, "I do care."
"Congratulations. A single ramhorn out of the suffocating flock," Karna sarcastically praised the Knight of Seiros, "keep telling yourself that every night you go to bed, alright?"
As Karna walked away from the scene, Vidar quickly followed as Cyrus looked back and spoke one last time before he left.
"My people tried to build a civilization and unite outsiders into our cause once before," he pointed out, "in the end, Mother Earth and Father Sky punished all of us for our hubris. Our lesson is that we're better off as a free-roaming herd than a united hegemony."
As the Battuan caught up with the other two, the three walked in silence before Karna broke the silence.
"So any of you, answer me this," asked the Professor, "do you think that Fodlan failed us or did it have nothing to do with us since the very beginning?"
"Ain't from here, for sure," Cyrus shrugged, "so don't ask me."
"... Fodlan... didn't fail... me..." Vidar grunted out, "... Fodlan hate... the weak..."
Karna lets out a sigh at the two's answers. "Figured," he rolled his eyes in disappointment, "as for my take on my own question... I'm honestly drawing a blank, but I'm biased towards the latter," the Professor pointed out, "I mean, when you're born a calamity that causes nothing but calamity after said calamity, then one's fate is already sealed, or at least it feels like an unreasonable uphill battle."
"Professor, our lives here was nothing but an uphill battle," Cyrus pointed out, "the only thing unreasonable about it is that we're not allowed to pick and choose our own battles, if any."
Vidar nods in agreement.
"... Damned bureaucrats," Karna clicked his tongue, "everything and every last one of those paper-pushers have to make sure everything is 'official', all because they're too scared to actually fight their own battles," he raged, "I get it, not everyone can and are willing to fight their own battles, but who gives a damn when we're the ones out here nearly getting ourselves killed every day just by existing, and all they give us nothing in return, just because we're outsiders?!"
"It is confusing," Cyrus remarked, "back at Battu, everyone fights together. Hell, my own mother took me out on raids when I was a baby and even gave me a sharpened rattle as my first weapon."
Vidar blinked blankly at Cyrus's claim, coming off as even a little too crazy even for him.
"... Did you kill anyone with it?" asked Karna, actually curious of that factoid that he'd never heard of.
"Sadly no, but I did cut off my potential kidnapper's finger with it," he answered.
"Ah," Karna remarked, just realizing that even Battu babies don't have enough muscular integrity to cut a vein, "fair enough."
"So what do we do in this day where we do nothing, Professor?" asked Cyrus.
"Who knows," Karna remarked, "just don't wander too far off the work camp lest Seteth gives us more hell to deal with later down the line," he smirked, "I like bullying him, but I know that he has limits. Also, the foreman didn't do anything to deserve our wrath and he's the one paying us."
Before Cyrus could complain, Vidar grabs his leg before tugging it to catch the former's attention.
"... Not... deserving..." he grunted out, mimicking the Professor's words.
Cyrus stares down at the bandaged boy's empty and agape eyes before relenting.
"... Gah, I can't get mad at you when you're right..."
And the three enter into another period of awkward silence upon walking into a nearly-finished village. Karna looks at his gloved hand, purple sparks and bolts crackling between his fingers.
"... I think I know what I should do next in my free time," he smiled as an image of barbs formed in his mind.
At An Undisclosed Location...
"... I honestly cannot believe that the message to the Archbishop got through the public mail," the Flame Emperor groaned in annoyance, "remind me, why did we send a death threat in the first place when the element of surprise was already on our side?"
"According to our sources, the Church itself already has a sense of caution that they always defaults into," the Black Mage pointed out, "by adjusting it to our favor or at least to our own anticipation, we can easily recalibrate our stratagem to catch them by surprise. Better to set the odds in our favor than the enemy do it for us."
"Agreed, it was a calculated risk," said the Flame Emperor, "but for someone who made said calculated risk, they are horrendously bad at math."
"For now, all we can do is wait," the Black Mage reaffirmed, "the Death Knight is sharpening his weapon as we speak and our sponsors are generous enough to send one of their own to be deployed out in the open for our next incursion."
"What are they after?" asked the Flame Emperor as he dragged the candlelight towards himself.
"The bones of the Goddess herself," said the Black Mage as he adjusted his hood, "if it even exists."
"... There they go again, chasing after ghosts," sighed the Flame Emperor, "if they wanted to go grave robbing, they could've at least be more upfront about it."
"Are they even upfront towards us about anything, if at all?" the Black Mage pointed out, to which the Flame Emperor lets out a deep sigh of resignation.
"... Fair enough."
Then in the darkness, a burst of light shone to the sound of wood being kicked open.
"Yo!" greeted a new voice, revealed to be another enigmatic figure completely dressed in thick and tight white robes with a black, beaked full-face mask, "Dark Mage Albion in the house!"
The Flame Emperor and the Black Mage both let out an annoyed groan as both of their heads hit the table's surface.
"Kill me."
"Later."
To Be Continued...
Author's Notes: Good to be back. A lot happened while boots were back on campus grounds.
First off, the context behind the canonical "Goddess's Rite of Rebirth" has been changed in this fic. Instead of finding the plans to murder the Archbishop within Lonato's hands, instead a death threat was directly delivered to the Archbishop in the most provoking way possible. That and well, the Flame Emperor's proactive measures and inadvertently Karna's intervention (that set the fort on fire) destroyed all paper trails implicating them, therefore covering their tracks and making Chapter 4 a surprise attack.
Secondly, still on the bridge of whether if Karna's group should stay out of the canonical mission segment just to not ruin the moment (and rub extra salt on the professor's wound). Maybe they come back as last-minute reinforcements for the canonical Chapter 4, or arrive at the aftermath. Who knows, whichever sounds more salty or badass.
And finally... again, it feels good to be back and all, but I've been putting off writing fanfic for a couple months so I'm a little rusty free-writing. Wrote a lot of papers and read a lot of poems and short stories that I didn't like (enjoyed reading, but not the content; the latter tends to be hit or miss). So unlike last year, I'm more skeptical with my return this time around.
References:
- Karna's bloated confidence upon wearing a steel helmet under his hood before being proven not so invincible after all is a reference to the bulletproof vest scene from Battle Royale movie (the manga adaptation had the guy with said bulletproof vest to keep said fact hidden before being shot in the crotch by a full-auto Uzi).
- Karna's non-sequitur is a reference to Cell's own non-sequitur from Episode 1 of HFIL.
- Cyrus' mention of a "sharpened rattle" was a tidbit from Lollipop Chainsaw.
- The white and black-colored Dark Mage that appears in the Chapter 4 cutscene's fic-exclusive name Albion is named after the Greek figure with the same name, who was the Giant son of Poseidon and went on to find an island nation and rule it as its king (which some interpretations imply that it may be England).
- Last two lines are from Team Fortress 2's "Meet the Medic" Video.